Close Readings in the saai Collection
This project views archives as the foundations of social processes, and thus as an ideal field of research and experimentation for investigating sustainable knowledge creation and data practices for the future. The aim is to use selected objects from the archive to make the saai | Archive for Architecture and Engineering transparently visible, within an architecture-specific context, as a place where knowledge is not only preserved but also generated, transformed, obscured, or destroyed, and to critically reflect on the significance of these processes in the emergence and consolidation of architecture-related narratives.
Photographic print of a school building in Berghausen by Alfred Fischer and Maria-Verena Gieselmann (from the 1950s), Alfred Fischer Estate, KIT. ©saai
Facts
| Project duration: | 2026–ongoing |
| KIT researchers: | Prof. Dr. Anna-Maria Meister, Mechthild Ebert – saai | Archive for Architecture and Civil Engineering |
Text (Short description, no more than 700 characters) “Frauen Bauen Baden-Württemberg at the saai” involves: a) researching and studying female architects of the 20th century and their completed projects in Baden-Württemberg—based on the saai’s collections; b) searching for any remaining materials from these architects for the archive; and c) integrating the results into the “Frauen Bauen” website. The project is carried out as part of architecture education and aims, in collaboration with students, to fill the gaps regarding female architects in the archive and in architectural knowledge in Baden-Württemberg, as well as to make the results visible and searchable via the existing website www.FrauenBauen.com.
Model of House Axster, Hilde Axster-Trappmann, Photo: Doris Hallama.
Facts
| Funder: | Wüstenrot Foundation |
| Total budget: | €31,612 |
| Grant amount: | €16,000 |
| KIT’s role: | Project Manager |
| Project duration: | 2026–2027 |
| KIT researchers: | Doris Hallama, Simon Rötsch – saai | Archive for Architecture and Structural Engineering |
Project partners
Team Frauen Bauen München (Doris Hallama, Jana Hartmann, Anna Jacob, Zora Syren).
A Socioecocritical Inquiry
This project examines more than three decades of global artistic responses to the ecological disaster caused by the 1986 explosion at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in northern Ukraine. By exploring how artists from Europe, Asia, the Americas, and other regions have engaged with this catastrophe, it deepens readers’ understanding of art’s role in addressing ecological emergencies. While art historical research may not bring about immediate material change, this work aims to shift academic discourse in the humanities toward environmental concerns, ultimately encouraging public support for mitigating the devastating consequences of the Anthropocene.
Facts
| Funder: | Alexander von Humboldt Foundation |
| Program: | Philipp Schwartz Initiative, including bridge funding |
| Grant amount: | Approx. €74,620 | €20,000 (flat-rate subsidy) |
| KIT’s role: | Project manager |
| Project duration: | 2025–2027 |
| KIT researchers: | Prof. Dr. Oliver Jehle, Dr. Nazar Kozak, PD Dr. Dr. Jesús Muñoz Morcillo – Chair of Art History |
Project partners
KIT International Affairs Business Unit.
Contact
Prof. Dr. Oliver Jehle
Phone: +49 721 608 42190
oliver.jehle∂kit.edu
PD Dr. Dr. Jesús Muñoz Morcillo
Phone: +49 721 608 42174
jesus.morcillo∂kit.edu
The Department of Homeland Security’s Social Media Visual Strategy
This research examines the strategic use of works of art from the canon of art history by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) on social media. Based on the DHS’s self-portrayal as the guarantor of a secure and forward-looking nation, the study aims to analyze how this vision is built upon an aggressive visual strategy. By examining and scrutinizing historical continuities, the research investigates the extent to which this form of digital image dissemination functions as a political instrument of propaganda, and why this mode of visual politics does not contribute to a “better,” utopian America—but instead promotes authoritarian and inhumane models of society.
A Heritage to Be Proud Of, a Homeland Worth Defending. Screenshot from the official DHS Facebook account. ©DHS/Facebook
Facts
| Project duration: | 2025–2026 |
| KIT researchers: | Dr. Ines Kelly – Chair of Theory of Architecture |
The Art Collection of the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology
This project reframes “access-making” as a critical and relational practice to explore how disability and race are configured in Donald Rodney’s *Autoicon* (1997–2000). More than a digital memorial, Autoicon is approached as a speculative interface that reimagines authorship, posthumous presence, and the ways in which access is shaped by both aesthetics and politics. Constructed from Rodney’s medical records, writings, and images, Autoicon offers a dispersed digital portrait that resists a coherent identity. The project positions it as an early prototype of AI subjectivity, anticipating current debates on algorithmic representation and the ethics of digital memory. By examining the intersections of art, disability, and technology, this project rethinks code not as a means of control but as a catalyst for access and aesthetic possibility. Drawing on Jeremy Bentham’s Auto-Icon, Donald Rodney replaces the body with a dynamic archive, revealing how disabled artists have long anticipated and reshaped emerging technologies.
Facts
| Funder: | KIT Freundeskreis und Fördergesellschaft e. V., Sparkasse Karlsruhe, dm-drogerie markt |
| Program: | Research grant for non-personnel costs |
| Project duration: | 2025–2026 |
| KIT researchers: | Prof. Dr. Oliver Jehle – Chair of Art History |
Project partners
Andrea Stengel and Jonas Zilius, KIT’s Communication and Marketing (KM) and Media Production (MEP) departments.
Practical Laboratory – Lime/Hemp Plaster and Natural Stone Masonry
In a village consisting of abandoned and partially dilapidated stone houses located in the forests of Piedmont in northern Italy, student workshops are held to contribute to their reconstruction. During these hands-on workshops, participants work with locally sourced materials and use historical construction techniques, including traditional stone masonry and the application of thermally efficient plasters made from lime and hemp. In addition, experimental research into historical lime plaster techniques is conducted. The resulting material samples are curated and exhibited in the KIT materials library.
Facts
| Project duration: | 2025–2026 |
| KIT researchers: |
Hon. Prof. Kerstin Müller – Chair of Circular Construction Annette Gerteiser |
Project partners
Canova Fondazione (Italy).
A Rammed Earth Project in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
The DesignBuildProject combines traditional Ethiopian building culture with modern rammed earth technology, making a significant contribution to the preservation of valuable cultural heritage. At its core is the further developed “Tukul 2.0,” which retains the characteristic circular form, materials, and social function of the East African one-room house. At the same time, structural weaknesses such as moisture damage and limited durability are addressed. Through the collaboration of KIT, AAU, and local craftsmen, a sustainable architectural approach has emerged that strengthens cultural identity while promoting resilient and forward-looking construction methods.
The rammed walls are made of two different types of earth. ©NB
Facts
| Funder: | Sto Foundation |
| Total budget: | €30,000 |
| Grant amount: | €25,000 |
| KIT’s role: | Project Manager |
| Project duration: | 2025–2026 |
| KIT researchers: | Lisa Behringer, Zegeye Cherenet Mamo, Prof. Dirk Hebel, Hanna Hoss – Chair of Sustainable Construction |
Project partners
Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia.
Residential Heritage in Times of Multiple Crises
The research project aims to integrate approaches to sustainability and resilience in addressing the residential architectural heritage from the Soviet era, with the goal of generating foundational knowledge and developing specific recommendations for resilient and sustainable urban development in cities across Ukraine, the Caucasus, and the Baltic region. The KIT subproject focuses on aspects of migration and the need for housing, as well as climate adaptation and climate protection. The work builds on the results of the first phase of research, in which the subproject analyzed morphological and typological transformation processes of residential heritage from the 19th and 20th centuries, identifying significant risks as well as potential opportunities.
Isonometry, Tramway Workers’ Housing Complex in Tbilisi. ©Ksenia Gulyaeva
Facts
| Funder: | Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF, Germany) |
| Program: | Area Studies |
| Total budget: | €381,000 |
| Grant amount: | €381,000 |
| KIT's role: | Project Manager |
| Project duration: | 2024–2027 |
| KIT researchers: | Prof. Dr. Barbara Engel, Dr. Anastasia Malko, Ekaterina Gladkova, Marina Sapunova – Chair of International Urban Planning and Design |
Project partners
RWTH Aachen, GWZO Leipzig.
A Global Superstar in Dresden
The year 2027 marks the 450th anniversary of the birth of Peter Paul Rubens (1577–1640). The Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister of the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden is collaborating with German and international partners to plan a major exhibition featuring around 100 works. Technological research conducted over a three-year period has provided new insights into Rubens’ painting techniques and the division of labor within his studio. The exhibition focuses on key works from the collection and significant international loans. Following several spectacular restorations, visitors will gain a fresh perspective on Dresden’s important Rubens collection and a comprehensive insight into Rubens’ multifaceted career as an artist, diplomat, and cosmopolitan.
Facts
| Project duration: | 2024–2027 |
| KIT researchers: | Prof. Dr. Holger Jacob-Friesen – Chair of Art History |
Early Modern Discourse on Nature and Textiles in the Cossack Hetmanate of the 18th Century
This project examines depictions of nature in textiles from the Hetmanate, applying an ecocritical perspective to explain the role these depictions played in shaping the habitus of the Cossack elite. Situated at the intersection of nature, art, and society, the project contributes to understanding the connection between nature and its representations in art. It explores the construction of identity in society. By defining the role of representations of nature, this project also sheds light on how people interacted with the natural environment in the early modern period, enriching the history of European and global textiles with previously unknown material.
Pelican Emblem on a Hetmanate Carpet.
Facts
| Funder: | Alexander von Humboldt Foundation |
| Program: | Philipp Schwartz Initiative |
| Grant Amount: | Approx. €68,880 | €20,000 (flat-rate subsidy) |
| KIT’s role: | Project manager |
| Project duration: | 2024–2026 |
| KIT researchers: | Prof. Dr. Oliver Jehle, Dr. Halyna Kohut, PD Dr. Dr. Jesús Muñoz Morcillo – Chair of Art History |
Project partners
KIT International Affairs Business Unit.
Contact
Prof. Dr. Oliver Jehle
Phone: +49 721 608 42190
oliver.jehle∂kit.edu
PD Dr. Dr. Jesús Muñoz Morcillo
Phone: +49 721 608 42174
jesus.morcillo∂kit.edu
Exploring Images of the Digital Imaginary
Following its launch, the CD-ROM was hailed as the digital medium of the future. By the standards of the time, its storage capacity was considered extremely high. Moreover, production costs were quite low, and it was easy to transport and distribute. This made it attractive to artists interested in exploring the possibilities of digital interactivity in a small format. In the CD- and DVD-ROM works of Chris Marker, Michael Snow, and Thierry Kuntzel, this is linked to a thematic focus on the (artist’s) archive, memory, and recollection. The project aims to analyze how the digital realm and the medium of the CD-ROM are conceptualized within this framework and manifest themselves in images.
Scan of a blank CD. ©Barbara Filser
Facts
| Funder: | German Research Foundation (DFG) |
| Program: | Priority Program “The Digital Image” |
| KIT’s Role: | Project partner |
| Project duration: | 2023–ongoing |
| KIT researchers: | Prof. Dr. Barbara Filser, Natalja Traboulsi-Wegner – Chair of Art History |
Interdisciplinary Theories and Methods
The design of architectural and urban planning, as well as public open spaces such as parks and squares, is typically linked to ideas about the societal, social, cultural, political, and identity-related effects to be achieved. The network “Impact Research in Architecture and Urbanism: Interdisciplinary Theories and Methods” addresses a lack of clarity regarding the concepts of impact at work in the built environment and brings together scattered knowledge across disciplines. It focuses on specific areas of impact: on conscious and unconscious perceptions by individuals; on individual or collective patterns of behavior and use; and on the effects that architecture has in spheres such as the economy, politics, and culture.
Workshop with the DFG Network “Impact Research in Architecture and Urban Design” at the KHI in February 2025. ©Anna-Maria Meister
Facts
| Funder: | DFG Scientific Network |
| Total budget: | €68,000 |
| KIT’s role: | Project partner |
| Project duration: | 2023–ongoing |
| KIT researchers: | Prof. Dr. Sabine Hansmann, Prof. Dr. Anna-Maria Meister – Chair of Theory of Architecture |
Project partners
Nadia Alaily-Mattar (Technical University of Munich), Kirsten David (Nürtingen-Geislingen University of Applied Sciences), Rainer Kazig (École Nationale Supérieure d'Architecture de Grenoble), Simone Kühn (Max Planck Institute for Human Development Berlin, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf), Leonie Plänkers (Darmstadt University of Technology), Sina Brückner-Amin (Deutsches Museum), Nina Gribat (Brandenburg University of Technology Cottbus-Senftenberg), Agnès Klöden-Billemont (Brandenburg University of Technology Cottbus-Senftenberg), Nora Küttel (University of Bremen), Julia von Mende (Frankfurt University of Applied Sciences), Sebastian Bührig (Leibniz University Hanover), Sophie Krone (Associate Member of the SFB 1265 “Re-Figuration of Spaces”), Theresia Leuenberger (University of Applied Sciences Northwestern Switzerland), Constanze A. Petrow (Geisenheim University), Gudrun Rauwolf (Berlin University of Technology).
Touchingly Human
Antonio Allegri, known as Correggio (1489–1534), ranks among the most influential painters in art history. For centuries, he has been celebrated for his innovative use of light, his vibrant, cheerful figures, and his reinterpretations of both religious and erotic themes. Based on the unique collection of his panel paintings in the Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister and the restoration of Correggio’s *Madonna of St. Sebastian*, the exhibition features exceptional international loans from all over the world. This first comprehensive survey of his artistic career ever presented outside of Italy highlights Correggio’s mastery in conveying deep emotion and draws attention to his unparalleled ability to portray the divine in a convincingly human light. A scholarly catalog will be published in German and English.
Facts
| Project duration: | 2022–2026 |
| KIT researchers: | Prof. Dr. Holger Jacob-Friesen – Chair of Art History |
Global Ecocritical Art History as Environmental Communication
The project “Grasping the Pictures of Eco-Futures” brings together art historians and researchers in science communication to make a sustainable and visible contribution to the Anthropocene discourse within and beyond their professional circles. The main focus is on the visual cultures of ecological management in the past and future (“Ecotopias” and “Eco-Futures”). To this end, a network of scholars will carry out the following activities: two online lecture series, a one-day authors’ workshop to plan a subsequent book publication, and targeted public engagement activities.
Facts
| Funder: | Schleicher Foundation |
| Program: | KIT Giving/Climate and Environment |
| Grant amount: | €8,000 |
| KIT’s role: | Project manager |
| Project duration: | 2022–2026 |
| KIT researchers: | Prof. Dr. Oliver Jehle, PD Dr. Dr. Jesús Muñoz Morcillo – Chair of Art History |
Project partners
Peter Krieger, National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM).
*Concealed Views and Female Perspectives in Architecture
The M*1:1 research project aims to present a holistic view of gender roles in architecture, thereby strengthening the role and visibility of women in the discipline. Although more young women than young men study architecture, statistics show that the proportion of women declines sharply as they progress through their professional or academic careers. Ultimately, significantly fewer women than men are employed as professors at the university. This raises questions about the career paths taken by former female students and the conclusions that can be drawn from this for the future. As part of the project, an exhibition was held showcasing a diverse selection of female architects from KIT Karlsruhe. Through its content and accompanying program, the exhibition shed light on past and present injustices. At the same time, it presented positive role models and demonstrated how one can forge one’s own path despite existing structural injustices. The research findings will be compiled in a comprehensive publication scheduled for release at the end of 2026.
Facts
| Funder: | KIT Gender Equity (funded by the University of Excellence), KIT Foundation (Gips-Schüle Foundation), Baden-Württemberg State Association Foundation, Wüstenrot Foundation |
| Grant amount: | €86,395 |
| KIT’s role: | Project manager |
| Project duration: | 2021–2026 |
| KIT researchers: | Sandra Böhm, Dr. Anette Busse, Fanny Kranz, Dr. Nina Rind, Dr. Manuela Gantner – Chair of the History of Building and Architecture |
Contact
Dr. Anette Busse
anette.busse∂kit.edu
Sandra Böhm
sandra.boehm∂kit.edu
Dr. Nina Rind
nina.rind∂kit.edu
Participatory, Experimental, Research-Led Teaching & AI in Art History Education
This is a long-term project involving the development and testing of frameworks for new teaching formats based on research and/or AI resources for art history. These frameworks are developed and tested through ongoing teaching. The goal is to create a curricular protocol based on these new formats, particularly those that use AI both as a research tool and as a subject of research.
Seminar Impression, 2020. ©Erna Fiorentini
Facts
| Project duration: | 2020–ongoing |
| KIT researchers: | Prof. Dr. Erna Fiorentini – Chair of Art History |
Artistic Media Research in Early Video Art
The Raindance Corporation, a New York collective of video pioneers, was seeking new ways to produce and share knowledge using portable video technology that had become available in the late 1960s. The group expressed its ideas in writing, but also through its videos, a major collection of which is preserved at ZKM Karlsruhe. The project explores the collective’s goals and how these are reflected in its tapes, which have hardly been studied yet. In a series of research-oriented seminars—to be continued in 2026—students searched for information on tapes from the ZKM’s archival holdings, described and analyzed them, and in the process completed entries in the collection database.
*A Media Primer*, 1970, Raindance Video Collection, ZKM | Karlsruhe. @Raindance Foundation, Michael Shamberg
Facts
| Programs: | arch.lab, KIT Teaching-Research-PLUS |
| Project duration: | 2020–ongoing |
| KIT researchers: | Prof. Dr. Barbara Filser, art history students at KIT – Chair of Art History |
Project partners
Felix Mittelberger, Wissen – Collections, Archives, and Research, ZKM | Center for Art and Technology Karlsruhe.
Online Archive of Reference Projects
The archive offers photos of models that can be viewed in three dimensions, as well as sets of plans available for download, for a growing list of completed architectural projects. New references are added every two weeks. The material is intended to support research and teaching. Models and drawings are produced by students at the KIT School of Architecture under the supervision of the R+E professorship.
3D-navigable model photo. ©R+E
Facts
| Funder: | Wüstenrot Foundation |
| Grant amount: | €10,500 |
| Project duration: | 2020–ongoing |
| KIT researchers: | Prof. Marc Frohn, Tim Panzer, Irene Gazzillo, Pierre-Emmanuel Gernay, Federico Perugini, David Wasel, Masa Mori, Marco Zelli, Florian Bengert, Adrianne Wilson Wootton – Chair of Architectural Space and Design |
The Planning of UC Irvine’s Educational Environment, 1932–1965
“From Farms to the New Frontier” reconstructs the planning history of the University of California, Irvine campus in the postwar period. Using multimedia “paper trails” from institutional archives, the study analyzes how a planned educational experiment on a Southern California farm sought to shape a new generation of “educational pioneers.” The work focuses on four key areas: planning bureaucracy, land acquisition, cybernetic systems, and visual self-representation. In doing so, it challenges dominant narratives of “progressive” architecture in 1960s California. The dissertation was honored with the 2024 KIT Dissertation Award.
Aerial View of Campus, 1968. Early Campus Photographs Album, AS-056. ©University of California
Facts
| Funder: | LOEWE Research Doctorate Program |
| Program: | Architectures of Order – Practices and Discourses between Design and Knowledge |
| Project duration: | 2020–2023 |
| KIT researchers: | Sina Brückner-Amin – Chair of Architecture Theory |
Living Labs: Socialist City
The central question addressed by the project is how to secure the existing living space in large housing estates in former socialist and post-Soviet cities for the future and develop it further in a sustainable manner. The aim is to identify the spatial strengths and weaknesses of the housing estates—in terms of both the living space and the residential environment—in order to develop recommendations for action based on this analysis. The results will serve as guidelines for the further development of the existing housing stock. In addition to concepts for specific case studies, generally applicable planning approaches will be developed.
Scenario of the Green Superblock, Vazha-Pshavela Block IV, in Tbilisi. Source: Alexandre Okrostsvaridze
Facts
| Funder: | Volkswagen Foundation |
| Program: | Trilateral Project Cooperations |
| Total budget: | €296,400 |
| Grant amount: | €296,400 |
| KIT's role: | Project manager |
| Project duration: | 2019–2027 |
| KIT researchers: |
Prof. Dr. Barbara Engel, Ekaterina Gladkova – Chair of International Urban Planning and Design Nikolas Rogge |
Project partners
Ilia State University (Prof. Dr. Ia Kupatadze, Dr. Nano Zazanashvili), Odessa State Academy of Civil Engineering and Architecture (Prof. Dr. Olga Savytska, Dr. Nadiia Dmytrik).
Marcel Meili wrote throughout his professional career. For him, writing—like architectural design—was a means of producing knowledge, and in this sense a necessary extension of the design process. Between 1980 and 2019, he produced approximately 160 texts. Numerous manuscripts remained unpublished. The book *Texte zur Architektur* brings together, for the first time, about half of the recorded texts and showcases the richness and breadth of his work. Through his written work, Marcel Meili shaped Swiss architecture over more than thirty years in a reflective and discursive manner. Many of the texts reveal foresight and a political stance on issues that remain highly relevant today.
Facts
| Funder: | Marcel Meili |
| Total budget: | Approx. €200,000 |
| Grant amount: | €110,000 |
| Project duration: | 2019–2026 |
| KIT researchers: | Prof. Christian Inderbitzin – Chair of City and Housing |
Project partners
Markus Peter and Thomas Kramer, Zurich.
The Late Antiquity Modeling Project
The Late Antiquity Modeling Project (LAMP) is an international, interdisciplinary research collective. LAMP uses computational and architectural methods to reconstruct the embodied experiences of ancient buildings and landscapes. In doing so, the project creates more accurate and embodied histories of religious communities across geographic and temporal contexts. Of particular interest to LAMP is how these embodied reconstructions might be leveraged to rewrite the history of the first centuries of Christianity. Our current research focuses on the late antique necropolis of El Bagawat in Egypt’s Kharga Oasis. Our previous research examined the Christian building at Dura Europus.
Facts
| Project duration: | 2018–ongoing |
| KIT researchers: | Dr. Joshua Silver – saai | Archive for Architecture and Civil Engineering |
Project partners
Dr. Camille Leon Angelo – University of Alabama, Department of Religious Studies.
Following the first project phase, “Emancipatory Housing” (2018–2020), the subsequent project on the German-Israeli architect Myra Warhaftig highlights her second area of focus—architectural history—specifically her documentary work on the exile of Jewish architects during the Nazi era.
Facts
| Funder: | German Research Foundation |
| Program: | Research grant for non-personnel costs |
| Grant amount: | €178,000 |
| Project duration: | 2013–2030 |
| KIT researchers: | Prof. Dr. Martin Papenbrock – Chair of Art History |
Project partners
SAAI – Archive for Architecture and Engineering at KIT.
Graffiti Information System in Germany
The “Information System on Graffiti in Germany” (INGRID) is a collaborative project between the Department of German Linguistics at the University of Paderborn and the Department of Art History at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT). The project’s goal is to collect and digitize photographs of graffiti, systematically annotate them in a database, and make them accessible for scholarly research. By providing legally usable images and high-quality metadata, the project aims to lay the groundwork for interdisciplinary scholarly research in the field of graffiti.
Facts
| Funder: | German Research Foundation |
| Program: | Scientific Literature Services and Information Systems (LIS) |
| Grant Amount: | Approx. €2,000,000 |
| KIT’s role: | Project partner |
| Project duration: | 2012–2030 |
| KIT researchers: | Prof. Dr. Martin Papenbrock – Chair of Art History |
Project partners
Dr. Doris Tophinke and Dr. Gudrun Oevel, University of Paderborn.
Yearbook of the Guernica Society, Inc.
Facts
| Funder: | Foundation for Critical Arts and Cultural Studies |
| Total budget: | Approx. €3,000 per year |
| Project duration: | 1999–ongoing |
| KIT researchers: | Prof. Dr. Martin Papenbrock – Chair of Art History |
Project partners
Andrew Hemingway, University College London.
An Ecocritical Perspective
This project explores Rubens’s late landscapes from an ecocritical perspective. Most authors view these paintings as a private endeavor informed by Stoic ideas about nature. However, the interrelationships between Dionysian motifs, Epicurean ideas, and Rubens’s taste as a collector of antiquities reveal a complex materialistic and environmental awareness that challenges established notions of early modern conceptions of nature, particularly regarding the supposed moral superiority of culture over nature. The project delves into unexplored aspects of Rubens’s work, focusing primarily on how the artist integrated aesthetics, mythology, ancient philosophy, and scientific observation into his landscapes.
Peter Paul Rubens – Dance of Mythological Figures and Villagers (1630–1635). Source: Museo del Prado, Madrid.
Facts
| Funder: | The Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, MA (USA) |
| Program: | Research and Academic Program at the Clark Art Institute |
| Grant amount: | Approx. €26,000 |
| KIT’s role: | Project partner |
| Project duration: | February through June 2026 |
| KIT researchers: | PD Dr. Dr. Jesús Muñoz Morcillo – Chair of Art History |
Project partners
Williams College, Williamstown, MA (USA).
ERASMUS+ Blended Intensive Program – BIP
In the BIP, international experts introduced key topics related to understanding Dionysian sources and their impact in postclassical times. Art historians and classicists discussed with the students the challenges researchers face in fully understanding ancient sources, and the potential of classical tradition and ecocritical approaches as methodological tools for elucidating the role of the Dionysian mysteries in early modern intellectual circles, as well as in modern and popular culture. As part of the BIP, participants visited the Karlsruhe Collection of Antiquities at the Badisches Landesmuseum and the Collection of Early Modern Art at the Staatliche Kunsthalle Karlsruhe.
Moritz von Schwind – Dance of Satyrs and Bacchantes Around the Herm of Dionysus (1842). Source: Staatliche Kunsthalle Karlsruhe.
Facts
| Funder: | European Commission via DAAD |
| Programs: | ERASMUS+ and EPICUR |
| Grant amount: | €5,200 and student stipends from their home institutions |
| KIT’s role: | Project manager |
| Project duration: | June 30 to July 4, 2025 |
| KIT researchers: | PD Dr. Dr. Jesús Muñoz Morcillo – Chair of Art History |
Project partners
KIT International Affairs Business Unit, EPICUR Network, University of Salamanca, University of Strasbourg, Complutense University of Madrid, Charles University in Prague.
This project reframes “access-making” as a critical and relational practice to explore how disability and race are configured in Donald Rodney’s *Autoicon* (1997–2000). More than a digital memorial, Autoicon is approached as a speculative interface that reimagines authorship, posthumous presence, and the ways in which access is shaped by both aesthetics and politics. Constructed from Rodney’s medical records, writings, and images, Autoicon offers a dispersed digital portrait that resists a coherent identity. The project positions it as an early prototype of AI subjectivity, anticipating current debates on algorithmic representation and the ethics of digital memory. By examining the intersections of art, disability, and technology, this project rethinks code not as a means of control but as a catalyst for access and aesthetic possibility. Drawing on Jeremy Bentham’s Auto-Icon, Donald Rodney replaces the body with a dynamic archive, revealing how disabled artists have long anticipated and reshaped emerging technologies.
Chat function of Donald Rodney: Autoicon, 2000, CD-ROM version. ©The estate of Donald Rodney.
Facts
| KIT’s role: | Project partner |
| Project duration: | 2024 |
| KIT researchers: | Dr. Virginia Marano – Chair of Theory of Architecture |
Project partners
Lise Meitner Group “Coded Objects,” led by Anna-Maria Meister at the Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz – Max Planck Institute.
Origins, Objects, and Standardization of Emergency Architecture in the UNHCR Handbook for Emergencies (1982)
In December 1982, the UNHCR published a small blue book of 200 pages containing 14 sketches—and produced one of the most influential documents in humanitarian emergency relief to date. This dissertation examines the first edition of the UNHCR Handbook for Emergencies as a turning point: from context-specific, often ad hoc emergency architecture toward an increasingly institutionalized, globally operating system. At its core lies the Paradox of Standardization—for the handbook paradoxically established the very professional standardization it simultaneously sought to avoid, while explicitly calling for local, context-specific solutions and to “involve the refugees, whose home it will be.”
Printed copies of the UNHCR Handbook for Emergencies, UNHCR Archives, Geneva (August 2022). ©Hannah Knoop
Facts
| Program: | CuKnow |
| Total budget: | €1,500 |
| Project duration: | 2020–2026 |
| KIT researchers: | Hannah Knoop – Chair of Theory of Architecture |
Practices of Production and Exhibition in the Works of Eva & Franco Mattes and Evan Roth
From the perspective of an art history attentive to infrastructures and the networked nature of contemporary art production, this PhD project explores how to account for the omnipresence yet persistent invisibility of cables, and how to describe their function and materiality in artworks and exhibition spaces. Are cables merely a means to an end, an interchangeable utility, or an integral component of the work itself? Drawing on case studies by Evan Roth and Eva & Franco Mattes, whose works incorporate cables and visibly wire exhibition spaces, this project examines whether art-historical methods are equipped to grasp their role and tests approaches from infrastructure studies and STS.
Facts
| KIT researchers: | Erec Gellautz – Chair of Art History |
Tracing the Ecology of Architectural Production
This project examines the digital technologies that underpin the network of architectural design and construction. Through the specific hybrid practices that emerge with digital technologies, this research project seeks to account for the participants that digital technologies draw into the design and construction process. Such an expansion in scope also brings the global dimensions of architectural digitality—including the ecological impacts of these technologies—into our current understandings of practice. In this process, we develop archival tactics and strategies for accessing, managing, and preserving born-digital data in collaboration with KIT’s SAAI | Archive for Architecture and Engineering.
Facts
| Funder: | KIT Karlsruhe Institute of Technology |
| Program: | Postdoc at SAAI |
| Project duration: | 2 years |
| KIT researchers: | Dr. Joshua Silver – saai | Archive for Architecture and Civil Engineering |
Architectural Image and Tectonics as Reflected in the Photography of Germán Téllez in Bogotá, Colombia
This research focuses on photographer and architect Germán Téllez’s high-contrast black-and-white architectural photographs from 1961 to 1985, treating them as a space where technical photographic processes and tectonic decisions are jointly negotiated. Moving between urban, architectural, and façade scales, close readings of selected images reveal how deep structural expressions, material textures, and sun-control devices produce and stage shadow in Bogotá’s modern buildings. By utilizing shadow both as a method and a subject of research, the study argues for a shift away from the European modernist discourse focused on light and explores how the modern perspective is enacted in different parts of the world.
Catedral Primada de Colombia, Germán Téllez Castañeda 1984, Registration Number 32186. ©Colección Museo de Bogotá
Facts
| KIT researchers: | Carolina Alvarez – Chair of Theory of Architecture |